AUBURN | It was rough, it was tumble and had the feel of an SEC game.

For 20 minutes, Texas Southern gave No. 13 Auburn all it could handle. The second half, however, belonged to the Tigers.

Auburn shot 56.0 percent from the floor after the break to beat TSU 72-56 Friday night at Neville Arena. AU improves to 4-0 on the season.

"It was pretty tough,” said Chris Moore. “We really respect every opponent we play … so we knew it was going to be a dog fight. We knew it was going to be a very aggressive game. Our mentality is playing what our coach says, excuse my language, balls to the wall.”

The Tigers did it without leading rebounder and second-leading scorer Johni Broome, who sat out with a minor knee injury.

In his stead, K.D. Johnson with 16, and Jaylin Williams and Chris Moore with 14 apiece, all stepped up with a season-high in points.

Williams added a team-high eight rebounds, four assists and four steals along with two blocked shots. He played a team-high 25 minutes including a couple of rotations at center as he helped fill Broome’s missing minutes.

“We struggled a little bit defensively in the first half. Just to get ahead and an early half — like, last year, second half was a struggle for us. I feel like we've been much better,” said Williams. “There's much older guys on the team, and we're just pushing through and doing better to start the second half.”

Moore also had a strong all-around game with seven rebounds and three assists. He scored 11 of his 14 points in the second half, making all three of his field goals including 2 of 2 from 3-point range.

Leading scorer Wendell Green was held to just four points on 2 of 6 shooting.

“Wendell had been playing so well in our first three games that Johnny just wasn’t going to let Wendell beat us, and so they doubled him a lot in those ball-screens, and it bothered him,” said AU coach Bruce Pearl. “But that’s what your teammates are for. I thought that we had a bunch of guys respond, and obviously Chris Moore played really well.

“Great balance, too. I just think that was something that was obviously evident, and I just think we did what we needed to do in this four-game homestand. I do think we’ve gotten better. I do think we’ve learned, and we’ll go from there.”

Auburn led 29-27 at halftime after shooting just 3 of 15 from 3-point range and committing 11 turnovers. The Tigers took control with a 11-0 run early in the second half to go up 40-31 and added another 11-0 run in the final six minutes.

Pearl expects Broome to return for back-to-back games next week.

“He banged knees in the game against Winthrop, tightened up on him that evening and hasn’t been able to practice. I think he’ll be fine for Cancun,” said Pearl

Auburn plays Bradley Tuesday and Northwestern or Liberty Wednesday in the Cancun Challenge. Tip-off Tuesday is scheduled for 5 p.m. CT on CBS Sports Network.